A Message From Education Action: Toronto March 22, 2010 It's time to stand up against standardized testing, school closings, and the current assault on Ontario's classroom teachers Dear Friends, Following Education Minister Dombrowsky's insistence last month that she is "focusing on improving test scores" - refusing to consider our teacher unions' request to scale back provincial standardized tests - we now have Premier Dalton McGuinty's announcement of an Ontario Education Summit in September 2010 bringing together some of the world's most aggressive standardized testers. Dombrowsky says that the discussion will "focus on achievement targets and assessing student performance with measurable data." As the Toronto Star describes the leading figures of this summit, it will be "co-chaired by famed reformers Michael Fullan and Sir Michael Barber, gurus to McGuinty and instrumental in former British prime minister Tony Blair's revamp of public education. A key presenter will be Obama's secretary of education, Arne Duncan, famed for a 'tough love' approach that helped clean up Chicago schools.... Another major player attending is Andreas Schleicher, head of indicators and analysis at the directorate for education of the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) which coordinates policies for the world's 30 richest nations." It is no exaggeration to say that the work of these four men has been a disaster for public schooling. In the next few months we will bring our readers up to date on what their work - focused on what they understand to be "human capital" production - has meant to the real lives of children in our schools, especially in poor, racialized neighbourhoods. But it is not just children who are suffering under the regimes these corporate-minded bureaucrats and "educators" have helped to construct. Teachers are now consistently under the gun - their professional autonomy systematically undermined, their capacity to teach increasingly undercut. In this context, we encourage you to read two documents: The first is a draft position paper produced, after many discussions with teachers and communities, by Education Action: Etobicoke North. The paper is entitled "It's time to stand up for our classroom teachers." Please click HERE to download. The second document is a fine piece of research recently produced by the Elementary Teachers of Toronto (ETT) called Voices from the Classroom: Experiences and Perspectives of Elementary Public School Teachers in Toronto. Please click HERE to download. Say No To School Closings A Message from the Campaign for Public Education to Public School Supporters Everywhere in Ontario Please circulate the petition (attached below) calling for a "freeze" on all school closings and ARCs until the province reviews its school funding formula. It is a moderate and responsible request for a temporary halt to the ARC process. We need this pause so the public can fully appreciate the magnitude of the Accommodation Review process. School trustees have the power to delay setting in motion an irreversible series of school closings and sale of publicly owned school lands. This petition is available in 14 languages besides English. If you need copies in Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish, Chinese, Korean, Tamil, Filipino, Hindi, Urdu, Vietnamese, Farsi, Arabic, Somali or Karen, please contact news@campaignforpubliceducation and we will gladly forward as many as you need. When the petition's pages are filled with signatures, please mail them to: Campaign for Public Education, There is also an organizing pamphlet attached below. Please collect signatures everywhere: churches, mosques, temples, service clubs, unions, professional associations, ethno-cultural organizations, recreation and fitness centres, seniors' and adult education and community programs, even door to door in your neighbourhood. Most people are unaware that their local schools are in jeopardy. Click here to download our "Freeze School Closings Now" petition. The issues of standardized testing and school closings are going to be key issues in the upcoming trustee elections. So also is the issue of giving our teachers the freedom to teach. Make sure your trustee candidate is on side on all of them. In solidarity, George Martell and Faduma Mohamed, |
This email was sent by Education Action: Toronto 1698 Gerrard St. East, Toronto, On. M4L 2B2 |